Steven Johnson: Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of InnovationReally intrigued by the title. Fabulously diverse in examples. If you ever felt like a square in round world, this book will make you sing for joy because that's what life is about--growing, moving, evolving.... The book is much stronger for being in Science section and not restricted to business innovation alone.

Sep 17, 2004

The Tao of Tomatoes

While I am a big fan of Tom, I find myself noticing that the rant is pegged too far on the yang scale for me lately. Yang?!? Since everyone is speaking so much of China these days, it seems fitting that we look at ancient Chinese philosophy for guidance.

While Tom says tomAto, and they say TOMaTO - frankly, it all really looks more like Tom says YANG! and they say (yawn)yang to me.

Bear with me if you still don't know what the world "yang" means. It's the whole topic of an upcoming series of posts.

And if you do know what I'm talking about you're thinking that's a typical thing for a girl to say. The fact is I've been mostly yang all my life. And I've already mentioned that most of my friends are male. One (of many) reasons I hated the book (I'm not even to bother to link to it) Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus is because I totally identified with all the male characteristics.

It'll mainly be exploring two premises in Tom's rant (and strewn throughout Re-Imagine) that I like to present with a little dash of yin throw in.

First, while we can certainly use more women in business (that's a start), what we really need more integrated, whole people in business, period.

Second, radical effective change is not necessarily only accomplished in the doing doing doing and the stomping and the tearing apart and the 80-hour weeks.

Most people - myself included - that come from Western training initially approach the I-Ching as well as later related schools of thought such as Taoism with total incomprehension.

The phrase "I-Ching" is written as two Chinese characters. The second means a book, a profound book. The first character means ease or change. Some people call it "The Book of Ease" or "The Book of Changes". The yin-yang is a symbol combining the sun (top) and moon (bottom). The two taken together - in other words, non-dualistically - represent the universe. It's a symbol used in many Asian cultures to symbolize the unity of the two "opposite" male (yang) and female elements (yin). Although yin and yang may appear to be opposites, they only exist by virtue of each other.

Funny, earlier this week I was pondering the thought that perhaps one reason that Asia may overtake the U.S. in the end isn't only attributable to what everyone else is saying.

It's just a wild hare, but I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, Asians may accrue an advantage because of their long history of non-dualistic thinking - the very essence of their world view is oriented towards wholeness and integrity.

Comments

Not just about temperament. I mean Tom is a couple of notches up on the yang scale from "they". "They" are yang - maybe frightened-paralyzed yang, but yang too. I'm not advocating a yin approach either but rather perhaps looking at an integrated, holistic approach that is more than the sum of the ying-yang parts. It's a entirely different world view, a different mental model than anything taught in Western schools. Although I think many people feel this tug towards completeness in mid-life or sometime in their own personal adult development. More in posts to follow.

Nice comments, Evelyn. Your post has got me thinking about yin and yang, something my wife has been trying to achieve for years!

Incidentally, if you didn't like Men Are From Mars etc (which I haven't read), you might like "Why Men Don't Listen and Women Can't Read Maps: How We're Different and What to Do About It" (which I have read). Then again, you may dislike that one even more!